Method of and System for Detecting Spam Activity in a Cloud System

1. A method of detecting spam activity in a cloud service, the cloud service hosted on a server, the server having a first digital object and a second digital object stored thereon, the server being accessible, via a communication network, by a plurality of users of the cloud service, the method executable by the server, the method comprising: receiving from a first user of the plurality of users of the cloud storage service an indication of a first sharing action for sharing access to the first digital object; responsive to the first indication, incrementing a first sharing counter value of a first sharing counter dedicated to the first digital object, the first sharing counter being indicative of total sharing actions associated with the first digital object across all of the user accounts of the cloud storage service; receiving from a second user of the plurality of users of the cloud storage service an indication of a second sharing action for sharing access to the first digital object; responsive to the second indication further incrementing the first sharing counter value of a first sharing counter dedicated to the first digital object; responsive to the first sharing counter value reaching a pre-determined threshold value, executing a spam preventive action associated with the first digital object; the second digital object having a second sharing counter associated therewith, the second sharing counter being indicative of total sharing actions associated with the second digital object across all of the user accounts of the cloud storage service; and the first sharing counter and the second sharing counter being incremented independently therebetween in response to sharing actions associated with their associated first digital object and second digital object.

2. The method of claim 1 , wherein each one of the first user and the second user is respectively associated with a first user account and a second user account in a cloud service.

3. The method of claim 1 , wherein at least one of the first digital object and the second digital object is one of: a file, and a folder containing at least one file.

4. The method of claim 1 , wherein the first digital object has been previously uploaded to the server by at least one of the first user and the second user.

5. The method of claim 1 , wherein both the first user and the second user have access to the first digital object.

6. The method of claim 1 , wherein the sharing action includes at least one of: generating a public link associated with one of the first digital object and the second digital object; sending a public link associated with one of the first digital object and the second digital object to one or more public users; and sending to one or more invited users an invitation to join a shared access to one of the first digital object and the second digital object.

7. The method of claim 6 , wherein the at least one of the first sharing counter and the second sharing counter is additionally configured to be incremented responsive to at least one of: an invited user accepting an invitation to join the shared access to the respective one of the first digital object and the second digital object, and a public user accessing the digital object through the public link associated with the respective one of the first digital object and the second digital object.

8. The method of claim 1 , wherein prior to the receiving from the first user of the plurality of users of the cloud service the indication of the first sharing action, the method further comprises: receiving from the first user a first upload action for a first version of the first digital object; receiving from the second user a second upload action for a second version of the first digital object; and executing a de-duplication process to store a single instance of the first digital object, the single instance accessible to both the first user and the second user.

9. The method of claim 8 further comprising storing only the single instance of the first digital object on the server.

10. The method of claim 8 , wherein executing the de-duplication process comprises: responsive to determining that the first version of the first digital object and the second version of the first digital object are the same, discarding a selected one of the first version of the first digital object and the second version of the first digital object, the selected one being a later received version of the first digital object.

11. The method of claim 8 , wherein each of a first user account associated with the first user and a second user account associated with the second user are assigned a link pointing to the single instance of the first digital object.

12. The method of claim 1 , wherein the spam preventive action comprises at least one of: transmitting an indication of the first digital object and the associated sharing actions to a human assessor; blocking the first digital object for sharing; blocking the first digital object for access; deleting the first digital object; blocking at least one user account of one of the first user and the second user; sending a warning notification to one of the first user and the second user; sending a notification indicating a potential spam distribution to public users; and sending a notification indicating a potential spam distribution to users invited to join a shared access to the first digital object.

13. The method of claim 1 , wherein at least one of the first sharing counter and the second sharing counter dedicated to respective one of the first digital object and the second digital object is associated with a respective one of a first time parameter and a second time parameter.

14. The method of claim 13 , wherein at least one of the first time parameter and the second time parameter is indicative of a time taken to reach the respective one of the first sharing counter value of the first sharing counter and a second sharing counter value of the second sharing counter.

15. The method of claim 13 , wherein the at least one of the first time parameter and the second time parameter is indicative of an average incrementing speed of the respective one of the first sharing counter and the second sharing counter.

16. The method of claim 13 , further comprising, prior to the executing a spam preventive action associated with one of the first digital object and the second digital object, assessing the respective one of the first time parameter and the second time parameter associated with the respective one of the first sharing counter and the second sharing counter dedicated to the respective one of the first digital object and the second digital object.

17. The method of claim 16 , wherein assessing the respective one of the first time parameter and the second time parameter associated with the respective one of the first sharing counter and the second sharing counter comprises comparing the respective one of the first time parameter and the second time parameter to a time parameter threshold value.

18. The method of claim 17 , further comprising executing a spam preventive action associated with one of the first digital object and the second digital object only responsive to the respective one of the first time parameter and the second time parameter exceeding the time parameter threshold value.

19. The method of claim 17 , further comprising executing a spam preventive action associated with one of the first digital object and the second digital object only responsive to the time parameter threshold value exceeding the respective one of the first time parameter and the second time parameter.

20. A server configured to detect spam activity in a cloud service, the server comprising: a communication interface for communication with an electronic device via a communication network, the electronic device being associated with one of a plurality of users of a cloud service provided by the server; an interface module; a user account module; a storage unit; a processor operationally connected with the communication interface, the user interface module, the user account module and the storage unit, the processor configured to cause the memory module to store a first digital object, the processor being further configured to: receive from a first user of the plurality of users of the cloud service an indication of a first sharing action for sharing access to the first digital object; responsive to the first indication, increment a first sharing counter value of a first sharing counter dedicated to the first digital object, the first sharing counter being indicative of total sharing actions associated with the first digital object across all of the user accounts of the cloud storage service; receive from a second user of the plurality of users of the cloud service an indication of a second sharing action for sharing access to the first digital object; responsive to the second indication further increment the first sharing counter value of the first sharing counter dedicated to the first digital object; responsive to the first sharing counter value reaching a pre-determined threshold value, execute a spam preventive action associated with the first digital object; and to cause the memory module to store a second digital object, the second digital object having a second sharing counter associated therewith, the second sharing counter being indicative of total sharing actions associated with the second digital object across all of the user accounts of the cloud storage service; and to increment the first sharing counter and the second sharing counter independently therebetween in response to sharing actions associated with their associated first digital object and second digital object.